THE ANNUAL MEETING. IOI 



can tell you. But so long as this Interim Authority is in 

 existence you may be sure it is the intention of every member 

 of it to keep in close touch with the various Societies which 

 represent the forestry industry in this country — this Society and 

 the similar one in England, and the Land Agents' Society in 

 England, and the Factors' Society in Scotland, and also the 

 teaching centres, and that is about the most useful thing we 

 can do at the present time." 



The President. — " We are very much obliged to Colonel 

 Fothringham. I think what he has said rather emphasises the 

 necessity of the resolution which is now to be submitted to 

 the meeting." 



13. The Realisable Resources of the German 

 Forests. 1 



I. 



The long war from which we are emerging has terribly tried 

 our French forests, formerly so rich and beautiful. The fellings 

 made for the needs of the army, those made with incredible 

 vandalism by the enemy in the parts he occupied, which were 

 precisely the best wooded in the country, have impoverished 

 and ruined them for a long period. As to the woods situated 

 in the region of the front, there remains too often nothing but 

 a mere vestige of them. 



The damage done to our forests cannot immediately be 

 restored by spending money. A house may be rebuilt, a 

 factory can be provided again with the essentials in a few 

 years ; to reconstitute a forest there is required, not only money, 

 but time. Our forests will not be re-established at their past 

 degree of high value within a century. 



This situation is the more disquieting because it is precisely 

 at this moment, when the sources of wood production are so 

 much reduced, that our needs have enormously increased. We 

 have to rebuild our houses and to replace our furniture and 

 appliances. It will be absolutely necessary to take from the 

 forests of the enemy what we need, and which he owes us, to 

 replace what the war has caused us to lose. My object is to 



1 Translated from an article by M. Huffel in the Revue des Eaux et Fortts. 



